I'd personally love a Tera Sinube figure myself - he's certainly on my top ten list of CW figures I'd like to see made. Hopefully he appears in the series again, giving him a chance at a figure...

Even if that elderly Jedi were to make an appearance again in the series, there is hardly a chance that Hasbro is going to make him into a figure. Kids are not going to want a figure of a narcoleptic Jedi with a proclivity for doing things slowly. I loved the character; but c'mon - we're talking about dollars and cents here.

Well, I got an "infraction" from that moderator; and this infraction expires on December 12th, whatever that means.

That's what I was wondering, what it even means. Is that like nerd probation?

KitFisto wrote:

You know me, I try to be nice to everyone, but this guy is acting like a dweeb.

It's precisely why I don't bother with their forums. His behavior is just a reflection of the prevailing attitude on that site.

KitFisto wrote:

If wishes were horses...

darth_sidious, the mod from Rebelscum wrote:

I'd personally love a Tera Sinube figure myself - he's certainly on my top ten list of CW figures I'd like to see made. Hopefully he appears in the series again, giving him a chance at a figure...

Even if that elderly Jedi were to make an appearance again in the series, there is hardly a chance that Hasbro is going to make him into a figure. Kids are not going to want a figure of a narcoleptic Jedi with a proclivity for doing things slowly. I loved the character; but c'mon - we're talking about dollars and cents here.

Which he clearly does not comprehend. If some Hasbro employee "wants" him to be made, then he probably will! That's how these decisions get made, you know._________________

That's what I was wondering, what it even means. Is that like nerd probation?

I think that it's like a yellow card in soccer. I'm gonna have to sit in the penalty box for 10 minutes.

Caped Crusader wrote:

If some Hasbro employee "wants" him to be made, then he probably will! That's how these decisions get made, you know.

Of course that's how they're made! My guess is that these Hasbro "reports" are leaving out the most important part: "We'd love to make figures of Mother Talzin and, say, Senator Farr, buuuuuuut...."

Let's face the music here and recognize that Hasbro employees like their paychecks, too. They're not going to greenlight a bunch of pegrotters.

And here's my response to the mod's post over at Rebelscum:

I wrote:

I sure hope that Hasbro has a few surprises to reveal for the latter part of 2011; but I'm not holding my breath. I would love to see a Pong Krell figure made; but he is an antagonist and I am not sure how well a figure of him would be received by kids. Hopefully as well as Savage Opress. I feel that it's a safe bet that the final five will include Darth Maul, since he is an established character in the franchise, a proven seller, and his appearance in the cartoon will coincide with the release of The Phantom Menace 3D. My guess is that we'll see a repaint of the phase 2 clone trooper, a repaint of an ARC Commander (Citadel Fives), a repack of Ahsoka, and maybe Pong Krell. Those are my guesses; time will tell. And I would say that there is practically a zero chance for Tera Sinube - he's a tertiary character who appeared in one episode. Hasbro has already told us that they are not doing that kind of stuff.

QUESTION: Have you given any thought to making some figures of Original Trilogy characters in the Clone Wars/Animated style? I think that companies like Gentle Giant with their maquette line and ACME with their Character Keys have proven that collectors and fans would love to see OT characters in this newly animated style. I think it would be a neat little sub-set perhaps, like putting one of 12 characters in every case, or an online retailer exclusive box set?

ANSWER: Sideshow and Gentle Giant have different business models entirely than Hasbro, and the choices we make have to be based on what will give us the greatest return on the investment of our time and resources. With the myriad of choices available to us for figure inspiration (OTC, Prequel, videogames, comic book, Clone Wars animated, McQuarrie concepts, Vintage-style) our toughest choice sometimes is narrowing down the ideas to the most important ones on which to focus and making choices on what *not* to pursue. We have found one thing to be true for Star Wars 3-3/4" figure collecting: not all stylistic interpretations are popular with the majority of the fans. The realistic style figure is much more popular among the majority of collectors when compared to the animated styling, and doing OTC figures in this style would not be a good avenue for us. Likewise, some fans have asked for Vintage-style versions of more modern characters and that too is an avenue that we have chosen not go down. Instead, we'll stick to the separate realistic and animated lines for now, each universe to itself.

QUESTION: It seems like with each new episode, "Clone Wars" gives us two, three, sometimes an entire squad of "must have" Clone Trooper characters/figures. How do you keep up with that without ending up tearing all your hair out?

ANSWER: What a fantastic "problem" to have! As it turns out, over the course of a season there are a manageable number when mainline figures and battle packs, and exclusives are taken into account. We can just about cover them all with some leftover reserves if we ever need more. The reality is that there is such a diversity of types of episodes that many don't feature clones at all (or just Cody/Rex) which gives the clones a breather every now and again, shining the spotlight on some other equally cool corner of the Star Wars Galaxy. We love it all!

I had an experience at Walmart today which made me think about all that wishing going on over at the Rebelscum forums. As I walked down the toy aisle, there was a woman in front of me looking through the Star Wars toys. She was looking at the deluxe figures, and she put three deluxe packs (Obi-Wan with Freeco Speeder, Buzz with BARC Speeder and ARF Trooper with AT-RT) in her cart. She then put a single-carded ARF Trooper in her cart, and starting eyeballing a Saga Legends Anakin Skywalker. She noticed me waiting my turn, and she asked me, "Do you know Star Wars?" I nodded; and then she showed me the Anakin figure. "Is this a good guy?" I told her that he was a good guy in the prequels, but would become bad later in the series. She threw the figure in her cart, and told me that she was buying Christmas presents for her son. She then noticed an R2-D2 figure, and said, "Oh, R2-D2, I remember him." She got that figure, too.

So, she bought two heroes, a droid and three clone troopers. Yeah, I'd say the folks at Hasbro know what they're doing.

1. With [Jedi Master Pong] Krell and Umbarans in four episodes [of The Clone Wars, do] you think that's enough to warrant figures and vehicles? It kinda sucks that the show is picking up momentum and has some really cool stuff, and TPM crap is the focus of next year so the resources have gone there.
--Chris

Figures yes, vehicles probably not. Considering most clones from this episode are repaints (and the new helmet and body are coming), it makes sense that Hasbro might want to pursue a new Jedi with a batch of repaints-- but it might be as an exclusive, or a gift set... or in 2013. It depends on how many new items they want to make, really.

As far as vehicles, no, not really. If you look at Hasbro's track record, we've seen very few new Clone Wars vehicles for the bad guys-- the Mandalorian Transport is debatable given that it's used by more than just the Death Watch, and the bulk of other vehicles for the Separatists started life in The Phantom Menace, Attack of the Clones, or Revenge of the Sith. Hasbro has given very little love to the original creations of the 2008 TV show in terms of villainous vehicles-- we've had a few like the Super Vulture Droid, the Hyena Bomber, the Magnaguard Starfighter/Xanadu Blood, but those seem to exist to go with existing figures. We've seen virtually no non-robot soldiers of the Separatists as toys (or on the TV show really), so if I were to guess just based on what Hasbro has done so far? I expect no Umbaran vehicles.

From DewbackPatrolís interview with Hasbroís Jeff Labovitz at the 2011 New York Toy Fair (2/16/2011). The interviewer wrote that this interview recap was taken "partly from notes and partly from memory so donít take every word as exactly what he said."

1. Will there be a Clone Wars Duchess Sateen figure [this was asked with the hope that there would not be one]?

ANS. There will be no Duchess Sateen figure, and we will not be doing any of the senator figures from all the recent episodes.

3. Will there be a Savage Oppress figure because none were shown at Toy Fair?

ANS. We donít get to see the episodes far enough in advance to have the figures go along with the episodes. There will be multiple versions of savage coming out with different outfits. There will be multiple figures from the last two story arcs [The Night Sisters and The Mortis Trilogy].

Question: Any chance of seeing a 2-pk of TX-20 with Poggle The Lessor and 2-pk of General Trench and his Tatical Droid just like you did with Walmarts Jek, Yoda. Thire and Rys?

ANSWER: The exclusives cannot have a great deal of tooling, so anything that would involve all new figures (like Poggle or Trench) would be off limits. The Clones and TX-20 are much more likely, but would need to have the right character lineup to work (i.e TX-20 would have to make sense and be paired with the strong character to work out).

Question: With only 19 figures in The Clone Wars in 2012, can you reveal if Adi Gallia be one of them? She's been seen in several epsiodes of the show already, and she's about to hit the big screen again...it's time for her to get a new figure (a realistic version would be nice too!)

ANSWER: There are a total of 19 single carded Clone Wars Figures planned for 2012. Just over half have new tooling. Adi Gallia is not in the lineup.

Question: Throughout the Star Wars: The Clone Wars line, there has been a distinct lack of Separatist characters being made into figures other than Droids and high-profile characters like Grievous, Ventriss, or Dooku. Will we be seeing some new Separatist leaders in the TCW line at some point? That's not just counting generals like Osi Sobeck and Wat Tambor - how about a Lux Bonteri figure, possibly in his season 4 gear?

ANSWER: Our focus remains on more central characters who appear across multiple story arcs (always with some exceptions, of course). The Separatists are solid characters, but from a kid standpoint we believe there is greater interest in other areas, such as Jedi, Sith, Clones, etc.

I thought that these "When will we see X?" questions were unacceptable. And why would we see animated versions of Tarkin and Ackbar? They are tertiary characters who appear in a limited number of episodes. Hasbro has said repeatedly that these types of characters don't hold much appeal for kids. For the most part, only adult collectors (especially those raised on the original trilogy) get boners for them.

So, Hasbro has said that a little over half of the nineteen figures have new tooling. We have already seen fourteen; and of those fourteen, six have new tooling. If my math is correct, a little over half of nineteen is either ten or eleven. If that number is ten, then four of the unseen five will have new tooling. But if that number is eleven, then all of the remaining five will have new tooling. Is there a chance for Pong Krell? Still not sure if he garnered enough kid interest.

I thought that these "When will we see X?" questions were unacceptable.

It isn't so much that they're unacceptable as they won't get any kind of real answer in the Q&As. If anything, they're just pointless and a wasted question.

KitFisto wrote:

And why would we see animated versions of Tarkin and Ackbar?

Because other than more named Clone Troopers, they're the two characters I want most?

KitFisto wrote:

For the most part, only adult collectors (especially those raised on the original trilogy) get boners for them.

Aww...

KitFisto wrote:

They are tertiary characters who appear in a limited number of episodes. Hasbro has said repeatedly that these types of characters don't hold much appeal for kids.

I think Ackbar could do well with kids. He was a male hero who saw his share of action; he certainly fits the recipe for success better than Castas, Robonino, or Cato Parasiti. That's not to say that he fits easily into their current strategy, but I think a case could definitely be made for him. I think Tarkin would normally be a tough sell, but I'll be surprised if he doesn't eventually show up somewhere using Yularen's body and a new head. The uniform designs are close enough (nearly identical) to release the new character with a limited tooling investment.

It isn't so much that they're unacceptable as they won't get any kind of real answer in the Q&As. If anything, they're just pointless and a wasted question.

I see. Although I have yet to see anything in writing myself, I assumed that the HunterPR set out some sort of Q&A guidelines, so that questions like these would end up being scrubbed by the website admins.

Caped Crusader wrote:

Because other than more named Clone Troopers, they're the two characters I want most?

Precisely. Collector wishlists are printed on the toilet paper at Hasbro HQ.
But that's not to say that Hasbro completely ignores the collector - why else are we seeing re-releases of Aayla Secura and Hondo Ohnaka?

KitFisto wrote:

I think Ackbar could do well with kids. He was a male hero who saw his share of action; he certainly fits the recipe for success better than Castas, Robonino, or Cato Parasiti. That's not to say that he fits easily into their current strategy, but I think a case could definitely be made for him.

As you pointed out, Castas, Robonino and Cato Parasitti are part of Hasbro's retired strategy for character selection. I doubt we'll see the likes of characters like that for quite some time.

Caped Crusader wrote:

I think Tarkin would normally be a tough sell, but I'll be surprised if he doesn't eventually show up somewhere using Yularen's body and a new head. The uniform designs are close enough (nearly identical) to release the new character with a limited tooling investment.

I've been saying something similar about Master Di for a year now. They already have the head; and they could tweak the first Mace Windu body. There would be minimal tooling involved. But just like Tarkin, Master Di doesn't hold a great deal of interest for kids. So, unlike you, I would be surprised to see Tarkin show up at retail.

Caped Crusader wrote:

KitFisto wrote:

Is there a chance for Pong Krell?

I'm sure there's a chance, but I don't think it's likely.

That's what I am afraid of.

Last edited by KitFisto on Tue Dec 06, 2011 1:42 pm; edited 3 times in total